Night Terrors
by CJaMes12
Summary: This is based in the Chance at a Promise Verse created by WelshScot. Read and Enjoy and Wish the original Author a Happy Birthday. A Day in The Life.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N**

**"Oi, Welshald!" she shouted, trying to get the attention of the gamer in the room next door. There was no response.**

**"Welshald." CJ tried again, not bothering to rise from her desk or leaning in an atttempt to see in to the room. She knew what she would find. With the curtains drawn, the lights out and nothing but the TV screen to cast illumination, the room contained a creepy picture. Her friend was immobile, held under the influence of the game she began to regret him recieving that day.**

**So he sat, wearing out his thumbs in another DC game, completely forgetting things that were actually ****important. Like deadlines.**

**"C'mon, how many times do I have to say not to call me that!" said game-zombie moaned.**

**Happy to get a respose, she ignored what he actually said and ploughed on, doggedly"Have you done the next chapter yet? I' m getting nagged." **

**She could picture him waving his hand dissmissivly, eyes still on his avatar, reflecting that dead blue glow. "Yeah, yeah. It's on there somewhere."**

**CJ clicked around on different files, trying, as much as it repulsed her to get into the mind of WelshScot. Finally, _CAAP, Nxt Chap. 4 Edit,_ she clicked on it and frowned at the paragraph of text before her.**

**"I know I said send it in smaller chunks, but this is ridiculous." she muttered, disdainfully reading the ten lines of drabble. "I can't do anything with this."**

**But then... "Why don't I... It _Is _his birthday after all."**

**So fevourishly, after casting about for an idea, CJ lowered her head and began to type. It didn't need to be good, merely filler.**

**Obviously I don't own this. Even the verse belongs to WelshScot. If you haven't read his work, do so it is brilliant. Oh, and if you do, go review him a Happy Birthday, I want to see his face when he gets the emails. :)**

**Based of A Chance At A Promise: Summary, In the future the Naruto wins the war but everyone died. He was given a chance to go back and change everything. This isn't part of the Canon of the story.**

He was trapped in dreams of blood and pain. He writhed, trying to escape from his memories but all he could see was the fcae of the bitch who caused it all. He lept, hand outstrecthed to ensare her and punish her for all she did.

Suddenly the face changed. It grew younger, softer, the hair lengthened and her face was contorted in shock and surprise as she squealed, backing away from him.

Naruto looked down to see that his hand was clenched tightly around her wrist, tight enough to hurt. Sakura tried to wrench her hand away and temporarily, Naruto played with the ieda of just watching her struggle. Containing himself, he laxed his grip and allowed her to pull her wrist away, the skin red where he'd grabbed it.

Looking back up at the girl, who hadn't actually done any of the things he hated her for, yet, he caught a glimpse at a moment of shock and vulerabilty as she clutched her arm before it was consumed by her anger.

"Jeez what the hell was that for baka! You're the one who's late!"

Spotting the clock on the wall behind her head, Naruto realised that he'd somehow overslept. The girl now insignificant, he swore and in a flurry of blankets he was up. He darted around the ordered apartment, grabbing food as he moved so that, a moment later, he was dressed, packed and prepared for the day ahead, Sakura staring at him in shock. Just to top it all off, he had a bun in one hand and a glass of milk in the other which he downed before asking Sake soured ura.

"What are we waiting for?"

He was out of the apartment before she could respond, having left the glass in the sink and the nightmares behind him.

He was only vaguley aware of Sakura's shouts as he soared over Konoha, revelling in teh city at it's prime. It was young and completely unaware of the war that was stalking it, that was soon to come. The war that would drive it to it's knees and to the crater that Naruto knew too well.

This was _his _city, the one _he_ was gonna be Hoakge over, that he _had_ been Hokage over before the bitch had stolen it away from him. Along with everything else.

He pushed this feeling down within him, as one would quash bile and instead focussed in the wind about him as he leapt towards his destination and the rush everytime his foot left the ground, or roof. Nuance really.

He touched down lightly on the bridge, where Kakashi and duck butt awaited him. He croauched on the small wall that ran along the bridge, grinnign as Saskue glared and Kakshi maed some quip about being late.

"Just following your example Sensei!" Naruto grinned as Sakura landed on the stone of the bridge, notably a lot heavier that Naruto had.

Kakshi raised his eyebrow at this observation before sliding the book he'd been reading into one of his pouches and looking up to adress his team.

"'Kay guys, today we're going to go get ourselves a mission."

Duck butt raised an eyebrow and Sakura looked excited. Naruto just grinned wryly. He remebered when these 'missions' had started last time around. They now had two weeks of chasing cats and weeding gardens ahead of them. Oh joy.

He did enjoy the look of disappointment on his two teamates face though, when old-man revealed their task to them. That is something that he could happily appreaciate this time around.

"Well I'll leave you all to it then." grinned Kakashi before pulling out Ichi Ichi Paradise and settiling down in the crook of a tree to read.

Team 6 looked around the field that ehy had been told to de-weed. Sakura was speechless.

"This will take hours!" she whined.

This grated on Naruto.

"Better get started then." He replied, hiding his irritation under a cheery grin. HowaboutI take the far third, one of you takes the middle andthe other taked the end."  
Sakura looked about to scoff but Saskue, who was eyeing Naruto oddly nodded before walking to the corner, claiming the end as his.

Naruto wasted no time in leaping to the far end and cojuring as many clones as he could remmerb being able to muster the first time round. Plus maybe a couple extra. Half an hour later, he could be sound comfortably sitting, cross legged watching Sakura and duck-butt weed agonisingly slowly. He could hear Sakura's mutterings about "ninja standard."

Naruto just grinned, he remembered with slightly sadistic glee teh reactions of those he'd had the chance to give such tasks to as Hokage. He knew the reasons behind the tasks as well, recognising them as not a fruitless as they appeared. He felt Kakshi's eye on him and realised that Teamwork was vital in Kakashi's mind.

Sighing and wishing that he could leave the other two to stew in teh sun, he re-cast his clones and sent them over the field. However, as soon as either Saskue or Sakura stopped working, so did all the clones which stood from tehir work and watched the slacker creepily until they began to work again.

They finished in record time and Kakashi felt free to give them another, seemingly menial task. And another.

An hour after noon, he gave them leave and Naruto was gone in a flash, leaving Sakura and Saskue, dirty and irritable, as they straed after his retreating back.

Naruto washed quickly and was back out on the streets, this time strolling through as he looked for somewhere to eat.

He knew she was there before he saw her.

"Hey, Hinata-chan!" he ran towards ehr waving. He suddenly ralised that he had missed their mornign session. Shit. Guilt raged inside him and he bowed in penitition upon reaching her.

"I'm so sorry Hinata-chan. I overslept! it won't happen again promise!"

Hinata blushed to see the boy she liked bowing to her adn she stuttered, "It's okay. Naruto-kun, I understand if you don't want-"

The blonde cut cross her, "Oi, now you're extrapolating." Hinata paused to stare at Naruto's use of the word before he continued, "I overslept, by accident. I need to get a new alarm clock." A louder one to break thorugh his nightmares. "Seriuosly, I'm just sorry I made you wait up. Can I make it up to you ? Have you eaten?"  
Hinata shook her head shyly, and he grinned, "Lunch is on me!"

Together they walked down teh street, attracting looks and whispers. Naruto tuned them out,but the gist of them were, "What's the Byuuga heir doing with _him_?" Hinata looked at the whisperers baffled, she still didn't understand _why_ the adults rejected Naruto, but when realising that Naruto seemed unruffled, she took to ignoring them too.

Rye's restuarant was closed so they redirected thier feet to the reliable Ramen store. They chatted and messed around and Naruto felt happy. When he was with Hinata, he could almost forget the war and the past.

"Hey guys." Shikamaru had pushed aside teh flags and entered, sittng next to the pair, an eyebrow rised as he took in Naruto's Ramen mustache.

Naurto grinned adn flicked it, "Suits me, you think?"

Shikamaru rolled his eyes and ordered, settling down and breaking open his chopsticks.

"Busy day?"

Naruto let Hinata lead th econversation. She was so comfortable with Naruto's company by this point that she was so much more confident adn Naruto loved that about her. He watched her eys light up when she mentioned some trick Kiba had played and how she'd managed to win a fight in training thanks to her extra work with Naruto.

They talked as a group long after they'd finished eating, long enough to realise that they might as well order dinner as well.

By the the time he entered his apartment, Naruto carried a happy glow which was son dampened upon seeing the dark room. The bed exuded fear as he knew that as soon as he closed his eyes, that he would be back in the past, that he would see Shikamaru's death after watching his mourning for his child and Temari. He would rewitness Hinata' demise, torn apart protecting him and worst of all he would be thrown back into that ruin of Konoha.

He took as long as possible preparing for bed, the silence in the appartment eating away at him. The shadows kept at bay by the artificial light dashed to his heels as soon as he flicked it off.

He slid under the covers, the pressure ringing in his ears. His past always seemed more real in the dark adn it gnawed at him until his psych couldn't do anythin btu shut off to sleep, reliquishing itself to teh memories in full multicolour.

He pictured Sunshine-chan's face as it had been earlier, focusing on the tilt of her head, the shine in her hair adn he fought of the shadow trying to consume the image.

It was to his memories of that afternoon that he fell asleep, filled with anticipation for tommorow. However he'd been right. Once he slept, there was nothing that could hold back the night terrors.

**CJ sat back, re-reading her work. It wasn't the best. It was pretty non-sequential in the scheme of things. She was wirting pretty far out of her comfort zone. Even though she'd been the one to introduce Welshald to the manga, she'd been more drawn to the mysteries in Detective Conan.**

**Oh well, it would do. She brought up the web page and commited a final scan for 'teh' which she had a habit for typing.**

**Somewhat satisfied, she clicked 'Publish' and sat back, "Happy Birthday WelshScot."**


	2. Epilogue

**"He doesn't want to be Hokage any more..." CJ put her head on her keyboard, letting Welshalds words wash over her head, **

**"And," the Gamer continued, "you've written 'tehir' instead oh 'their', and you're supposed to be my Beta!"**

**"Wow, one typo." she deadpanned, head not moving as she stared determinedly at the 'B' on her keyboard, causing herself to go cross eyed, "That's earth shattering." Welshald didn't appear to hear her but kept on ranting.**

**"Did you save your game? Or did you just drop everything to tell me about my filler chapter?" Judging by the man's change in complexion ahd the way he darted into back into the lair he'd made of the far room, he had done the latter. A moment later the sound of fighting began to re-emit themselves from his bat cave as he resumed play.**

**" Why do I bother." I mumbkled into my desk before sitting up and pulling the keyboard towards myself. Time to work on my Sequel to Takagi: Looking Back, nearly finished it and all. Or, my eyes slid to the door into the far room. If posting the chapter had driven Welshald through here... maybe I could continue to disrupt him...**

**Apologies for tha lack of content. :) Can I have lee way as an unpaid assistant?**


End file.
